


I Spy with my Little Eye

by kazeshinobi



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Angst, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Self-Esteem Issues, pre-localization names
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-09
Updated: 2015-09-09
Packaged: 2018-04-19 22:18:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,708
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4763090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kazeshinobi/pseuds/kazeshinobi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After re-injuring his ruined eye, Zero's most deep-rooted fear is faced.</p><p>(In which Zero thinks he's garbage and Kamui thinks the world of him)</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Spy with my Little Eye

_‘_ _I promise to be true to you in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health…’_

* * *

__

_  
_

“Are you SURE you’re alright?”

“I’m fine, Kamui…” Zero grumbled, deflecting the prince’s hand currently inspecting his face.

Kamui pouted, looking at his husband with concern. They had come back home from a battle, relieved that both of them had come out unscathed when blood had started dripping from underneath Zero’s eyepatch, scaring the life out of the dragon prince! Zero had sworn and rushed off the bathroom, shoving paper toilettes in between his ruined eye and his patch.

The blood had momentarily stopped but Zero refused to let Kamui check the old wound, despite the younger man’s fretting.  Excuses of ‘I don’t ever mess with it’ and ‘I don’t like people touching it’ did not dissuade his fears that the old injury had reopened or needed medical attention. Why was Zero being so fussy?!

“At LEAST go to Elise and have her check it out!” Kamui persisted, laying a hand on his husband’s shoulder.

“Will you leave it alone? Enough with the nagging…” Zero groused, looking grumpy.

“It’s my job to nag, I’m your husband! Your WORRIED husband!” Kamui huffed, leaning on his tiptoes to press a kiss onto Zero’s nose.

The outlaw blinked, looking taken aback by the passion in Kamui’s voice. He sighed, sagging a little in defeat. Curse his stupid, adorable prince…

“Alright, I’ll go visit Little Miss Pigtails sometime tonight. Happy?”

“Yes!”

  


* * *

 “All done!”

“Thanks…” Zero replied, one hand coming up the feel the bandage wrapped securely around his ruined left eye.

The young princess had scolded him for not coming in sooner (though in such a cheerful voice that it was hardly threatening) before getting to work, immediately removing the eyepatch and disinfecting the scarred area beneath. For such a carefree, childish girl she was very capable as a healer, treating and wrapping the wound professionally in the span of twenty minutes. She seemed to know her way around the medical room well.

“Now, I think what happened was that your bad eye wasn’t actually cut, but hit with a blunt object. And since it’s such a sensitive wound, it immediately reacted to the blunt force against it” Elise mused, a finger on her chin.

“You have to make sure not to have any pressure on it for about a week. Oh, and you’ve got to get Kamui to rub this cream on it every night before bed!” Elise instructed, pulling out a small metallic jar from a nearby cupboard.

Zero stared at it, feeling his stomach sink.

“Why does Kamui need to be involved?”

“Because, you won’t be able to rub it on properly by yourself and you guys share a room? Duh!” Elise said with a smile, handing the jar over.

This was not good.

He had always held a certain fear, deep in his heart that he told himself was unfounded.

And yet, he never had the courage to test it.

If that fear was ever realized…

“Zero? You okay?”

“…Yes. Thank you for your help tonight…”

“No problem! Get well soon, okay?’

He nodded to the smiling princess as he left the room, the tiny jar clenched in his hand.

 

* * *

“How’d it go?”

“I just needed a bandage is all. I’m fine”

“Are you sure? You look a little… off…”

“Ah, it just hurts a little. Elise said to get some sleep, so I’m heading off to the bed.”

“O-oh… alright.”

Kamui stared, concern in his ruby eyes as Zero headed into the bathroom, navy cape fluttering behind him. The outlaw was definitely tense, deflected all his questions and then said he wanted to go straight to bed! This, coming from his husband who never missed a chance to tease and kiss him before going to sleep!

Either Zero was hiding something more severe or the injury was far worse than he had realized.

Kamui sat on the silk sheets, wringing his hands together. He couldn’t stand the thought of his husband being seriously injured, though Zero had told him quite clearly he was fine.

He didn’t look fine at all.

The sound of the bathroom door opening caught his attention, Kamui turning his head to watch Zero exit the washroom, now in his bedclothes.

‘Aren’t you going to wash up yourself?’ Zero questioned, moving to sit on his side of the bed.

‘Ah, yeah…” Kamui replied absentmindedly, having trouble taking his eyes off his husband.

Zero seemed to catch the meaning behind the look, giving the prince a shaky smile.

“I’m FINE, Kamui.”

Kamui nodded slowly, hardly convinced by the words but unwilling to press further into the man’s privacy. He left the bed and made his way over to the bathroom, giving Zero one last searching look before closing the door behind him.

 

* * *

Zero jolted awake, one good eye darting across the darkened room before realizing he was safe. He exhaled heavily, slumping back into the sheets of the bed as the horrific nightmares that plagued him danced before his eyes.

_Blood staining the pavement. The leering faces of his old gang. Master Leon, dead on the floor. Kamui, dead in his arms…_

He flung one arm over his eyes, attempting to control his labored breathing. It had started off as a memory and then had mutated into something horrible, his master and his beloved being sucked into the haunting nightmare. The outlaw heard Kamui stir softly behind him and immediately went quiet. He didn’t want to wake up his beloved and get him involved in his pathetic sleeping problem again.

He turned over as softly as he could, facing the man of his affection with a fond gaze. Kamui looked almost serene in his sleep, beautiful lips slightly parted and his raven hair in contrasting disarray against the white pillow. Zero was well aware that he didn’t deserve this angel of a prince, but his recent injury had reminded him once more of his true nature compared to Kamui’s purity.

_‘If you knew everything of my past, every inch of my revolting body… would you still love me so?’_

* * *

“Cream? What cream are you talking about?”

“You know, the cream I prescribed to Zero for his eye?”

Kamui stared, a mix of disbelief and annoyance in his stomach. He and Elise had been chatting over breakfast the next morning when Elise asked Kamui if the cream had stung Zero’s injury. The injury that apparently needed medical cream applied to it every night by Kamui, even though Zero never bothered to mention it!

“He never said anything about it!” the prince huffed, crossing his arms.

“Huh, that’s weird! Do you think deep down he’s really a big baby who hates pain?” Elise giggled between mouthfuls of porridge.

“No, I don’t think that’s it at all…” Kamui said with a blush, embarrassingly recalling the time Zero had asked for a spanking in bed, among other things.

“Either way, I’m going to find out why when he and Odin return from patrols!” Kamui stated, voice strained with frustration.

He stirred his porridge absentmindedly, eyes unfocused on the creamy mixture as his brain whirred with theories. Wasn’t the most basic rule of marriage that you shouldn’t lie to your husband or wife!? And over medicinal cream of all things?

Zero was not a man who was easily upset or agitated, in fact he loved doing it to others while retaining a cool head and nonchalant attitude. He really didn’t have any idea why he was acting strange and why he had an issue with medicine that would help him heal faster. If something was really, TRULY bothering him it was up to Kamui to find out what, why and how as soon as possible.

  


* * *

Zero ran a clammy hand over his face, grimacing at the sweat there. His patrols with Odin had been deceptively quiet for the first few hours, the other testing out ‘radical names’ for his newest tome and driving Zero insane after the young blonde tried to find as many synonyms as possible for the word darkness. Right before they were ready to head off bandits had appeared out of literally nowhere, probably sneaking closer to the castle when Zero was distracted with Odin’s rambling on whether ‘Midnight Bolt’ was a good name for a thunder tome.

Annoyed, tired and with someone else’s blood staining his cape, Zero headed straight in the direction of his bedroom, navigating the twisted corridors of the castle now bathed in moonlight. Almost sighing in relief when he saw the familiar door in front of him, he entered their shared room.

“Zero…”

The first thing he saw was Kamui sitting on the bed, fidgeting with a pillow in his lap and staring at the sheets. Rather than the usual relieved reaction from his husband when he came home late, the younger man seemed to be avoiding eye contact with him altogether.

Heart heavy, he walked gingerly over to Kamui and sat next to him carefully, the large bed dipping under his weight.

“I’m back. Did something happen?” Zero questioned, one eye staring with concern at the unusually reserved prince.

Wordlessly, Kamui brought out something from underneath the pillow in his lap. Zero squinted at the small object, eyes narrowing when his excellent archer’s eyesight identified what it was.

The jar of medicinal cream lay innocently in Kamui’s upturned palm, glinting in the low candlelight. Kamui hunched his shoulders, his face determined with a hint of worry ghosting his expression.

“Why don’t you want to get better…?”

Zero cringed, shoulders slumping.

“It’s not about me getting better-“

“Then, why didn’t you say anything? Obviously, I wouldn’t have minded doing it!”

“I know that! It’s… not about the cream…”

“Then, what is it? You’ve been acting weird for these last few days!”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“Why wouldn’t I? Why won’t you let me in, Zero?!”

“Because you’re a pampered little prince and I’m **SCUM!”**

**  
**

Kamui recoiled in shock, eyes wide in disbelief. Zero bit his lip. He hadn’t meant to say that particular part out loud.

  


“You… you don’t think that about yourself, do you?”

Zero snorted with mirth, a twisted smile on his lips.

“What better description is there? Trash, gutter born, vermin are all fairly fitting as well, aren’t they?” he spat out, sneering.

“What…? Zero, what brought this on?!”

Zero pressed one finger against his eyepatch.

“No matter how hard I hide it, my past remains and nothing will ever change that, just like this missing eye of mine. I close it off from the world with this patch, but I’m still hideous underneath…”

A beat of silence.

“Let me see it. Your eye…”

“You want to see it, huh… hmm, why not? You’ll finally be able to see the real me!” Zero spat with a twist of his lips.

This is it. There is where Kamui finally realizes he’s nothing but a lowlife thief and leaves him for good.

He knew it was coming. It didn’t make the deep ache of hopelessness in his heart any lighter.

With an air of finality, he took hold of the damned eyepatch and ripped it off with one hand, the pain from exposing it no comparison to the pain in his heart. The eyepatch fluttered down to the bed, leaving his face fully exposed in front of Kamui for the first time in their relationship. Despite his bravado, Zero couldn’t bear to see the look on his (his? Could he still say that?) prince’s face.

He couldn’t bear the see the look of disgust mar the beautiful features of his one and only love, said man who was probably getting ready to throw his engagement ring out the window. He could almost feel Kamui’s revolted gaze on his eye, that horrible scarred eye that marked him as scum. No matter how far he ran from his previous life, the evidence of his worthlessness was right there on his face. He closed his eyes in agony, waiting for the death knell.

Then… he felt lips press once, twice, three times against his scarred eye, much to his confusion.

He heard a sniffle. Bewildered, he opened his eyes.

Kamui was crying. The man who had stayed resolute through one of the most vicious wars in centuries was currently sobbing like a child, fat tears rolling down his face.

“I’m such a bad husband…”

“What?!” Zero asked, jaw going slack in disbelief at the younger man’s words.

“All this time, you’ve been feeling like this… Do I not tell you I love y-you enough? Have I made you feel insecure!? What can I-“

“It has NOTHING to do with you, you’re perfect! It’s not your fault I’m so screwed up!” Zero said earnestly, one hand reaching forward to wipe a tear off the prince’s face.

“Don’t talk like that! I adore you so much, every quirk and silly little habit of yours makes me fall more in love with you each day. Do you think I would have married you if I thought you were garbage, or vermin?! There is so much good in you, Zero… and seeing an old injury that was caused by your previous circumstances doesn’t change anything!”  Kamui finished, wet ruby eyes burning with passion.

He leaned forward, one hand reaching out and caressing the torn, scarred flesh of his husband’s ruined eye. Zero brought his own hand on top of it, squeezing it gently.

“I never wanted you to see… my true, disgusting self” Zero murmured, eye downcast.

Kamui shook his head impatiently.

“I love every inch of you, from bottom to top. Never change, Zero… I married a man who was brave, exciting, funny, protective and loving. And I can’t believe you can’t see all those amazing things in yourself. Your past doesn’t define you, my love. The only thing that scar shows to me is that you deserved better in life…”

Zero swallowed, a lump in his throat. Pathetically, he felt his eyes water in emotion.

Kamui smiled, a small hopeful smile with such sweetness and tenderness hidden there that Zero immediately felt his heart lighten.

“Thank you… I truly don’t deserve you, you know…” Zero whispered, voice almost choked up as he nuzzled his face into Kamui’s raven locks.

Kamui chuckled, holding the outlaw’s warm body close to him. He felt exhausted after going on a veritable see-saw of emotions, but after the dust had settled, they were no worse for wear.

“If anything, I’m glad we got our feelings out on the table” Kamui said, pressing a kiss on his husband’s cheek and grinning at the happy crinkle of Zero’s eye at the gesture.

“I… had feared this for a long time. But I’m glad they were proved wrong. I’m not glad that I made you cry, however…” Zero replied with lips pursed in displeasure.

He leaned in, pressing a wet kiss to Kamui’s neck and enjoying the way the younger man shuddered under the act.

“Let me make it up to you?” he breathed, looking up at Kamui through his lashes slyly.

Kamui snorted loudly in disbelief, the act at odds with the pure joy in his eyes at seeing his husband being like his usual, teasing self.

“Make up sex DOES sound nice…” Kamui purred, wrapping his arms around Zero’s neck lovingly.

Zero grinned down at the prince, his heart feeling as light as a feather. His husband loved him entirely for better AND for worse, his deepest fears had been assuaged and their relationship had been mended, perhaps even made stronger by the incident. Encompassing warmth filled him from head to toe, separate from the heat of the wild lovemaking that lasted long into the night, fueled by the desire and passion of each man for the other.

 

* * *

The jar of cream had been forgotten at the foot of the bed. Of course, Kamui got upset about his ‘irresponsibility’ when finding it abandoned the next morning. Zero just pulled him back into bed, laughing at the fretting of his beloved prince. He didn’t care if the wound took ten years to heal!

He had come to peace with it. Because whatever Kamui loved, he loved as well.

Maybe one day, Zero could love himself too.

 

**Author's Note:**

> This started out as a short drabble that ended up mutating into something really weird, lol. From several misc. lines Zero has, you can see that he can be VERY self-depreciating at times. I wanted to explore that a little with his biggest scar/reminder of his previous life. 
> 
> This will be my last KamuZero fanfcition for a while, but they still have a special place in my heart. I hope my crappy writing did them justice. :*) Up next is the winners of the poll we tried out on tumblr yesterday with F!Kamui x Leon being the winner!


End file.
